Christian Mathelot

(14 April 1923 - 1 April 2013, France)

Le Grand Cirque

Born in the Quartier Latin in Paris, Christian Mathelot began his comics career in magazine Gavroche in 1940. He subsequently worked for Éditions Mondiales from 1941 and for Éditions Marcel Daubin from 1946. He has spent most of his career in comics drawing for the magazines published by Marijac and Les Éditions de Chateaudun. In Coq Hardi, he illustrated episodes of 'Colonel X' with scripts by Marijac and a comic adaptation of Pierre Clostermann's autobiographical novel 'Le Grand Cirque'.

Le Raid Alaska-Terre de Feu (Coq Hardi #157, 1953)

In the magazine Mireille, he took over the artwork of 'L'Orpheline du Cirque' from Pierre Le Guen (also with scripts by Marijac). Other collaborations with Marijac include 'L'Étrange Croisière du Squalus' (1950) and 'La Fin du Monde est pour Demain' (1955-56). In addition, he drew 'Lili Hôtesse de l'Air' and 'L'Étoile du Cirque' in Frimousse. For Samedi-Jeunesse, he made 'Alerte à la Terre' (1958), 'Le Fils du Boucanier' (1959), 'Choucas l'Homme des Abîmes' (1959), 'Raid Alaska-Terre de Feu' (1960). The first two stories were also published in Atoll. His adaptation of 'Le Grand Cirque' was reprinted in the series 'Biggles présente..' by Éditions Miklo in 2004.